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DanS
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Kickball Capital of the World
Jan 1970
time: 00:26
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Productivity is slowing, but wow, what huge growth over the last 3 years! 
Productivity is the single biggest determining factor of the long-term living standard of a nation, so this sort of increase is fantastic news!
quote:
2004 Productivity Rate Caps Three-Year Run
By Martin Crutsinger
AP Economics Writer
Thursday, February 3, 2005; 8:41 AM
The productivity of American workers, the critical component for rising living standards, increased by 4.1 percent in 2004, capping a remarkable three-year period in which worker efficiency climbed at the fastest pace in a half century.
However, the Labor Department reported Thursday that productivity for the final three months of the year was up at an annual rate of just 0.8 percent, which was the slowest quarterly increase in almost three years.
The rapid gains in productivity began slowing in the July-September quarter when productivity rose by just 1.8 percent after increases at rates of 3.7 percent in the first quarter and 3.9 percent in the second quarter last year.
Productivity, the amount of output produced for each hour of work, is the key factor in boosting living standards because it allows companies to pay their workers more based on their increased efficiency without having to resort to raising the price of their products, which would increase inflation.
Productivity rose by 4.4 percent in both 2002 and 2003. When combined with the 4.1 percent increase last year, the 4.3 percent average gain for those three years was the strongest burst in productivity since 1948 to 1951.
However, the downside of that increased efficiency is that companies, by getting more output from their existing work force, are able to avoid hiring new workers.
That is what occurred during the recession year of 2001 and the following two years in which job losses mounted as companies, pressed by increased global competition, strove to get increased production from slimmer work forces.
The strong productivity gains have kept the lid on inflation, but now with productivity slowing, some analysts are concerned that the Federal Reserve will abandon its gradual approach to raising interest rates should wage pressures begin to mount.
In a second report, the Labor Department said that the number of newly laid off workers filing claims for unemployment benefits totaled a seasonally adjusted 316,000 last week, a decrease of 9,000 from the previous week, pushing new claims to the lowest level since early December. Claims had risen by 7,000 the previous week after having plunged by 49,000 for the week ending Jan. 15.
The decline of 9,000 jobless claims last week represented a better-than-expected showing. Many analysts had been forecasting not a drop but an increase of about 5,000 in new claims being filed. The four-week moving average of claims dipped to 331,500, the lowest level since early January.
On Friday, the government will report on unemployment in January. Many analysts are looking for the jobless rate to remain steady at 5.4 percent with businesses adding 200,000 workers to their payrolls, an improvement from the 157,000 jobs added in December.
For all of 2004, employment grew by 2.2 million workers, the first annual gain after three years of job losses as the counry struggled to cope with the 2001 recession and a jobless recovery that reflected in large part the ability of U.S. companies to get more output from a smaller work force.
The productivity report also showed that output rose by 2.8 percent in the fourth quarter while the number of hours worked was up by 1.9 percent.
The 0.8 percent increase in productivity for the fourth quarter was the weakest showing since a 0.4 percent drop in the first three months of 2001. |
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy...6-2005Feb3.html
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child of Thor
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ok well hows 'pretty big' ? 
Ah ok ref that last post cool. We are also having a shake up of pension issues here(they sort are having a draining effect on the economy like your medicare stuff). In fact i think the UK deficit is pretty high at the momment too. House prices are crazy - there has been a 30% drop in first time buyers, finding themselves priced out the market.
Last edited by child of Thor on 03-02-2005 at 21:34
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el freako
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Bristol, European Union
Oct 1999
time: 05:26
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quote:
Originally posted by DanS
Who ever said that payroll employment figures show a rise of 2.3 million since 2000? It certainly wasn't me. |
You use the BLS's payroll employment figures when you make your claims about employment growth, they show a rise of 2.3m in employment since 2000.
quote:
Originally posted by DanS
Rather, the big deal was made about a couple million new jobs since August, 2003, when the job market began to grow. |
Seeing as GDP has grown by an average of 3.7% since 2002 (3% in 2003 and 4.4% in 2004) how can you square rising employment with a reported productivity growth rate of 4.2% - if the data for productivity is using the the same employment figures that you like to quote then employment should have fallen by 1% since 2002 shouldn't it?
The employment data used for the productivity figures shows a rise of 1.2% since Q3 2002, whereas the payroll employment figures you like to quote show a rise of 2.4% - that means that the 218,000-a-month rise in employment since Q3 2002 that you make such a 'big deal' about is only 110,000 if the productivity data that you also trumpet is correct.
So either you are guilty of not knowing the difference between the measures (because you have not pointed it out to anyone) or you are deliberately picking the statistics that favour your political views - which is called 'torturing the data until it confesses'
Last edited by el freako on 03-02-2005 at 21:39
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Whoha
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The TOC is supposed to be classified guys...
Dec 2001
time: 23:26
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Yea sorry to rain on your parade DanS but Zkribbler is right, wages have to go up with productivity increases for there to be a living standard increase. That is just not the case. As far as the unemployment numbers, both surveys reflect quite well on the president historically, actual jobs isn't the problem for Bush, It is the fact that they are either mcJobs, or lower paying jobs:
"High-Tech Industry Becomes a Lower Wage Industry
Alan Tonelson
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
U.S. Wage Trends
Change in median income for technology professionals, 2002-2003: -1.49 percent
Last time this figure declined: 1972
Change in inflation-adjusted median income for technology professionals, 2002-2003: -3.68 percent
Last time this figure declined: 1988
Source: “Incomes of Technical Professionals Decline, IEEE-USA Salary Survey Reveals,” IEEE-USA, December 22, 2004, http://www.ieeeusa.org/communicatio...04/122204pr.asp "
http://www.tradealert.us/View_art.asp?Prod_ID=1231
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03-02-2005 20:24
fair one.
Rather, it'll be syphoned off to (a) increase dividends to the investors or (b) be used to buy out other companies, leading to decreased competition, which in turn leads to increased prices and decreased services. 
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